serendipity. [superbat]

indulgence.

Clark hadn't thought much of it. Any of it really.

He'd been so thoroughly enthralled in just enjoying Bruce that he hadn't really thought about much else. It's not until they stumble back inside that he pauses to think. His mother is seated on the couch, knitting needles in hand, with her mouth pinched into a tight line to suppress the hint of a smile. That's all he needs to realize that she knows something. She knows something and she's dying to speak about it but she's refraining from doing so. It's not until Clark glances down at what she's knitting that the cogs finally start turning.

Little white baby booties.

"We should get you upstairs." He tells Bruce who, even in his exhausted state, eyes Clark as if he can sense the shift in his mood, "You look like you're gonna pass out if I keep you awake any longer."

He excuses his odd behavior to which Bruce only rolls his eyes and goes to make his way upstairs.

Clark doesn't chance glancing behind them, but he can feel his mother's gaze on his back. She'd figured it out at some point. Somehow along the way, she'd gathered enough intel to figure out their absurd situation. His mother made a tiny pair of booties for all of the new babies in the family and she would never hesitate to tell him when one of his cousins was about to welcome a new member. It was her way of informing him that she was eagerly waiting for him to suddenly come home with some good news of his own. The last baby she'd made a pair for was about one now and Clark hadn't heard about any others. 

She hadn't said a word.

She hadn't even hinted at anything of the sort. Now, here she was creating a new pair.

He gets Bruce upstairs and pecks him on the forehead before mumbling some inane excuse about taking out the trash. He then makes his way back down to see his mother still working away at her seemingly half-done project.

He quirks an eyebrow and she just smiles the way she does when she finally gets what she wants.

"So, what was it?" Clark questions, taking a seat on his dad's old recliner.

Honestly, she could've started on the tiny things when he and Lois were together and maybe she just pulled them out today. Though, by the way she eyes him down, he doubts it.

"Why would you need to take a human man to an alien ship?" she questions, leaning over to grab her cup of tea.

Ah...it's a valid enough point.

"He has all that money and he can't find a doctor that can tell him what's wrong with him?" she adds, taking a sip.

So, that was it. That was all she needed.

"Plus, the last time the ducks did that was with Marsha," she points out. 

He really underestimated her even after all this time. Or maybe he'd just overestimated his ability to keep a secret.

He's not sure why he was so reluctant to tell her in the first place. He doubts Bruce would begrudge him for doing so. He just...the little heartbeat currently fluttering upstairs seemed so fragile, weak.

That, and he and Bruce hadn't had a talk about telling anyone who wasn't already in the know...because Bruce didn't really have anyone who wasn't. He didn't have parents waiting for him to come visit. He didn't have friends who weren't constantly checking in to make sure the man had fed himself today. He kept a tight knit group and they tended to figure him out pretty quickly without him having to say as much as two words. Clark, on the other hand, had people who cared for him from a distance. Those people would want to know; he would want to tell them.